Lowell couldn't believe that they were actually going to leave him there for real. Sure enough, not a second later, he found himself all alone buried under the vegetation, just him and the usual, never-ending and unbearable pain he had in his arm.
The sun was high in the sky and even if Lowell was in the shade, it started getting hot.
He couldn’t hear anything except the usual jungle sounds like leaves falling or bugs flying, while everything else was still, almost dead.
He was already getting thirsty but knew he couldn’t drink, because drinking meant moving, and moving meant giving away his position.
If I’d known about the Special Forces raid beforehand, I wouldn’t have tried to escape and Robertson would still be alive.
Lowell tried to push those thoughts out of his head but it was hopeless. He knew fully well that before trying to escape, the other four prisoners tried unceasingly to change his mind.
The Vietcong had always retaliated in some way after the fact, whether it be because of an escape attempt gone bad or something else.
Trying had been sheer madness.
It was obvious and there was no point in denying it.
Lying in the heat made Lowell sleepy, turning those thoughts into film as he drifted off to sleep.
In the end, Robertson had made up his mind to help Lowell with his getaway attempt.
In all actuality, they all had because once a prisoner decides to escape there isn’t much anyone else can do about it.
Being generous was how Robertson hoped to limit the damaging effects of Lowell’s attempt. Given that Lowell would do it anyway, helping him was the least he could do.
Overall, Robertson, that dickhead, was actually right about a lot of stuff.
Even if it hadn’t done him any good, seeing he was dead just the same.
You were right Robertson. I should never have tried to escape.
That’s when it all flashed back almost movielike. With the exception of a few details, the rest stayed pretty much the same.
He could see Robertson and himself attacking the guards. It was all happening with surprising ease but that was because after all that time, the guards had come to trust them.
Then there was the part about them fleeing through the jungle and the uncertainty over which direction to take.
After that, he remembered the four other prisoners behind them, when they came out screaming and last, but not least, the part when they got captured.
You already know the rest.
Even though they were injured, both of them ended up in solitary confinement. As a result, neither his shot arm nor Robertson’s cracked skull got any kind of treatment.
They spent three long days and nights in that damn, dark whole the ground. Lowell was suffering not only because of his arm but also because he couldn’t bear to watch how much agony Robertson’s cracked skull was causing him.
After so many months of suffering in the jungle, he’d believed it was finally over and done with, but in all actuality, it wasn’t.
He’d clearly been mistaken.
Those three nights spent bleeding in that pitch-black cell, and having to watch his pain stricken friend suffer, were the worst days of his life, by far.
They were long, almost never-ending nights of seeing Robertson’s hardship. The word 'horrific' had assumed entirely new proportions for him.
No one would ever understand, not ever.
Never ever, not even in a million years.
We will never free you – said one of the guards throwing food and water at them, even if Robertson was no longer eating at that point. Lowell didn’t even know whether it was day or night anymore.
There was no way anyone could possibly have the slightest idea.
Not in this lifetime.
You have seen too much (and all of them too horrific) that the rest of the world must never know.
You will never get back to the US to tell the story of what you have seen here.
What that means is that we can torture you till the very end.
So let me give you some advice, soldier.
Talk.
Because the sooner you talk, the sooner this will all come to an end.
Lowell started shaking.
Now his head was pounding as well, unquestionably from the heat.
Because I know you want to die, soldier. I can see it on your face.
Talk.
Let me put an end to all of this.
Let me kill you.
Those words were more painful than any kind of torture could be.
Lowell touched his arm and it hurt as much as when they had shot him.
He was hot, thirsty and the sun had barely shifted at all.
Why are we doing all of this?
If this keeps up, I’ll die from heat stroke.
The VCs will never come this way, there’s no way.
Lowell felt like he was going to puke.
He’d been lying there for too long. Even though it was hot the ground was wet and cold, and his arm was really starting to ache.
It had swollen to the size of a melon, and there was pus oozing out of his bandages.
You were wrong – he thought.
No matter how suicidal escaping may seem, you’ve always got to try.
The other four prisoners just wouldn’t see reason, and that, in itself was strange, very strange.
He honestly couldn’t understand it.
Something similar must have probably happened to the Jews in the Nazi concentration camps too.
Before ending up in Vietnam as a soldier, Lowell had read somewhere that if the Jews had rebelled all together in the camps, they could have actually overwhelmed their oppressors.
They would have suffered heavy losses but they would have made it.
Those were preposterously big camps though, with thousands of prisoners, not like the one he and the others were in.
There was no comparing his group to them though because it wasn’t the same and it wouldn’t have worked the same way.
Now he really felt sick.
He didn’t know how much more of this he could take.
The only consolation was that the sun had finally moved a little.
At least time was going by.
He must have passed out for some minutes before, without being the wiser. That was the only possible explanation for the fact that the sun had moved that much.
Lowell’s eyes were still closed when, out of nowhere, he heard a sound. Or at least he thought he’d heard something. A snapping sound, like a twig being broken or snapped in half, and with that realization, his eyes shot open again.
Something had actually moved behind him.
Lowell held his breath.
He didn’t move a muscle and strained to listen carefully.
It was quiet though, and there wasn’t anything moving now.
Deciding it was just a false alarm, he relaxed.
The heat felt like a blanket smothering him, keeping out all the oxygen.
It was hard to breathe under there.
Lowell turned slightly to have a look at his arm.
It was even more swollen than before.
The bandages were filthier too and excessively tight.
The teams’ antibiotics had arrived too late to help, so when he did eventually set foot in a real and proper hospital, they would amputate his arm for sure.
If they’d been stuck in that damn jungle for even only two or three days more, Doc (the team's practitioner), would have amputated it himself.
In fact, Doc had no qualms with operating right there in the middle of that fucking jungle, anywhere on the ground would have been fine.
A shiver went down his spine.
Then suddenly, behind him, in roughly in the same place as before, Lowell heard another noise.
This time, a feeling of terror shot through him like a lightning bolt.
He lost his breath straightaway as another pain this time as sharp as a knife, practically tore out his insides.
He was trembling now and could feel a lump forming in his throat making breathing impossible.
He wasn’t supposed to be shaking.
Shaking would give his position away.
The lump in his throat was getting worse and if didn’t pass soon, he’d have to cough.
Worrying about coughing made him feel suffocated even more.
His heart was going to explode.
It was pounding so loud they would hear it for sure.
Then, just when Lowell didn’t think it could possibly get worse, he saw a Vietcong.
His watched the soldiers’ shoulders surface a little at a time. He was moving in slow motion and with great caution.
Lowell shut his eyes tight.
Raven had suggested that, but he was terrorized.
It was too hard to bear.
Unable to resist, he opened them up again but the Vietcong was still there.
The entire upper part of his North Vietnamese uniform was visible now, and he couldn’t help but notice that it was not only spotless but perfectly ironed as well.
It was over.
They’d left him to his destiny.
Damn you – he thought referring to the Baker team.
I knew it, Damn you. You’ve left me here.
He was all tied up there, on his own, like a salami, barely hidden under a few leaves and with absolutely nothing to fucking defend himself with.
This was insane.
The whole thing was fucking madness.
His body shook even more violently bringing him to close his eyes again.
Assholes – he thought -.Assholes, traitors, murderers.
Oh God, please...
Just let me get through this alive, and I swear I’ll kill every single one of them.
This time however, when he opened his eyes again there were two VCs in front of him.
They’d doubled.
Oh God no, please. No, no, no. Please-please-please.
The God Lowell was praying to however, wasn’t listening.
Not even remotely.
On the contrary, it was doing the exact opposite, and completely ignoring him.
The two Vietcong soldiers were facing him and the fear in him was mounting, becoming too much to bear.
He felt something at his groin, but he chose to ignore it given everything else that was going on.
He could see the whole world staring at him through his enemies’ eyes.
One was smoking a cigarette serenely while the other held his AK at the ready but without pointing at anything in particular.
They were still facing his direction.
The two soldiers were there some time, glancing at him every so often as his heart pounded like hell.
His heartbeat wasn’t what you’d call regular any more though.
I’m scared to death – he thought
They’re frightening me to death.
He got a sharp pain in his left arm.
I’m having a heart attack– he thought.
Then the whole world started spinning around him like a dark tunnel.
He was going to pass out.
The Vietcong were still there in front of him, but now he was watching them through a looking hole that seemed far away and distant.
Hang on – he said to himself.
Just hang on.
He wasn’t able to resist however, and passed out.